Blooming season loaded with opportunities to take advantage of

Or you can do something fun - something that you thought about doing in January - or something you've never considered.

Here are 10 suggestions:

Park it

The Tri-State area has parks aplenty. There is nature, there are swings, there is history.

Visit City Park in downtown Hagerstown, the woods of Franklin County, Pa.'s Caledonia State Park or Harpers Ferry National Historical Park in nearby West Virginia.

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For information about the area's National Parks, go to www.nps.gov on the Web.

Ride a bike or take a hike

The C&O Canal towpath and Western Maryland Rail Trail are great for bike riding if you don't want to worry about cars.

The canal runs from Washington, D.C., to Cumberland, Md., and there are several local points of entry. For details, visit www.nps.gov/choh on the Web.

The 20-mile paved Western Maryland Rail Trail runs from just west of Fort Frederick State Park near Big Pool to just west of Hancock. For information, go to www.dnr.state.md.us/publiclands/wmrt.html on the Web.

If you don't want to go it alone, think about joining one of the Cumberland Valley Cycling Club's evening rides. For information, visit the club's Web site at www.bikecvcc.com.

The 50th anniversary of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas' hike along the C&O Canal will be celebrated this month when 70 members of the C&O Canal association hike and camp along the 184.5-mile route.

Anyone can join the group for day hikes, arriving at joining points by 8:30 a.m. Local points include Tonoloway Picnic Area on Friday, April 23; McCoy's Ferry on Saturday, April 24; Williamsport on Sunday, April 25; Dam 4 on Monday, April 26; and Antietam Creek Campground on Tuesday, April 27.

Trout Season opened in Maryland on Saturday, March 27, and runs through Sunday, May 16. Several Washington County fishing holes have been stocked - Big Pool, An-tietam Creek, Beaver Creek, and Greenbrier and Blairs Valley lakes, among them. Visit www.dnr.state.md.us on the Web to learn about fishing rules and opportunities in Maryland.

You can catch all the information you need for fishing in Pennsylvania at www.fish.state.pa.us, the Web site of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission.

Or hook yourself the West Virginia fish story at www.wvdnr.gov, the Web site of West Virginia's Division of Natural Resources.